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 i64 A Short History of The World grotesque, irrational and antiquated observances. Both Buddhism and Taoism (which ascribes itself largely to Lao Tse) as one finds them in China now, are religions of monk, temple, priest and offering of a type as ancient in form, if not in thought, as the sacrificial religions of ancieftt Sumeria and Egypt. But the teaching of Confucius was not so overlaid be- cause it was limited and plain and straightforward and lent itself to no such distortions. North China, the China of the Hwang-ho river, be- came Confucian in thought and spirit ; south China, Yang- tse - Kiang China, became Taoist. I Since those days a I conflict has always been traceable in Chinese affairs be- tween these two ! spirits, the spirit of the north and the spirit of the south, between (in latter times) Pekin and Nankin, between the ofiicial-minded, upright and conser- vative north, and EARLY CHINESE BRONZE BELL ^ ^.^. « ^ ^ p t 1 C a 1, Inccribed in archaic characters: "made for use by the elder of Hin8 artlStlC, laX and c'i„m%' B.^!"' ■'"""'=' ' " '^"" '""f °f "-^ ^""^ D*'""^'*'. si-f" experimental south. [IntluVictoriaand Albert Museum) Thc dlvlsionS of